I’ve watched a few of the winter season shows just recently, and so far I’ve found a couple to my liking.

Shuffle! Memories:
The first episode was just meh. It was mostly Rin talking and reintroducing the characters. The second episode was way better, mostly because it was about Kaede, although it just recapped a lot of what happened in the first half of the show, up to Kaede’s past (but in the order of the past going to the present, which is after she got sick), which isn’t really good because the studio’s reusing scenes from the older show, which does make the animation seem slightly inconsistent. Also, the opening and ending themes changed, and from what I hear, each episode will seem to have a completely new OP and ED based from the character the episode will focus on. Seems to be interesting, but only for the fans of the game and/or anime.

Gakuen Utopia Manabi Straight!:
I just watched a raw, so I honestly have no idea what the hell this show’s about. I do know it contains cute fat lolis who (have the potential to) do cute things. Cute is good; therefore, you must watch it.

Kyoushirou to Towa no Sora:
People say this is sorta related to Kannazuki no Miko, or whatever that show was called (I didn’t watch it). It’s about this girl named Kuu who wishes that a prince would appear and take her away from her crappy, boring life. Now we all know that that never happens in real life, but this is anime! So this guy appears out of nowhere, and (skip some parts here) apparently has no qualms about revealing her cleavage to the rest of the world (with other, purer intentions), but nobody cares! It’s clever fanservice insertion. There’s some other plot that I can’t really understand but there is some hawt yuri action in the second episode (which I haven’t watched; stupid shitty DSL); that’s more than enough to get me watching it. Oh, and there’s mecha too, but who gives a crap?

Venus Versus Virus:
I wonder why some people didn’t seem to like this show. The premise itself is kinda generic (high schoolers killing demon / demon-related things), but it hints yuri. Yuri is good. Not only that, one of the girls has heterochromia, another can go on a psycho killing spree, and both of them use guns (although one of them can’t even shoot straight). These traits are obviously moé, and moé is good too. I’m definitely watching this.

There are a good number of other shows I haven’t seen yet, including but not limited to: Hidamari Sketch (definitely gotta get this), Nodame Cantabile, Getsumento Heiki Mi-na (transformation scenes = bigger boobs!), and Saint October. I should really kick my internet connection for this.

The other not-new shows

Kanon:
So now we move onto the Shiori Arc. It seems to me that while Makoto got a relatively long amount of screentime (half of which was spent for some happy-fun-time comedy and what-not) while Mai didn’t get as much. Possibly, they will focus mostly on Ayu after Shiori’s and Nayuki’s arcs, though I would prefer if they latter two got more screentime. Uguu does not strike as being more moé as something like, Ichigo jammu, but I guess that’s just me. All I can say to a certain friend is that Kanon >>> Death Note.

Sound Online‘s Blue Constellations really rocks. It’s wonderful music to listen to while working, and the vocal track, Eternal Rite is just mind blowing. Aki Misawa’s voice seems so… ethereal. Trust me, you have to listen to it. It’s just too good to miss. In fact, the album’s probably good enough to make you quit mainstream music and listen to doujin stuff instead. I still haven’t listened to its sister album, The Garnet Star, by Masayoshi Minoshima of Alstroemeria Records fame though.

These guys should go pro instead; it’ll make tracking down their CDs slightly more possible.

Other other stuff:
I added a whole bunch of new blogs to the blogroll. Please click on them so there’ll be a minute chance that they’ll add me. lol
I also noticed that a third to a half of those said bloggers are Singaporean. Seems like they’re growing into quite a community of otaku (who have Kinokuniya, grr…) whilst we Filipinos don’t get much attention. Except bluemist. He’s an exception because he’s in Japan. lol

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Many, many, many thanks go to Hung, of AnimeNano fame, and Omni and the rest of the guys at Random Curiosity for having screenshots up so I could use them. Also, a very big apology to you two for using them without permission. orz